


The Stupidest Thing You've Done

by invisible_slytherin



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Battle of Hogwarts, Final Battle, Happy Ending, Hopeful Ending, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pansy is a good friend, comfort too ig, i havent read the books in years so sorry if some parts dont match up, outside pov, pansys pov, third person tho never fear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 15:24:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20245060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/invisible_slytherin/pseuds/invisible_slytherin
Summary: "She could only watch as the floor opened beneath Draco's feet and he almost fell into the gaping hole of despair."Or, the one where Pansy is there for her best friend when everything seems lost and, after the Battle of Hogwarts ends, Draco stops pretending and hiding his feelings.





	The Stupidest Thing You've Done

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by [this](https://slytherins-are-cunning.tumblr.com/post/186900979097/not-gonna-lie-but-id-love-a-fanfic-where-draco) post by @/slytherins-are-cunning on Tumblr.

Draco Malfoy prided himself with being cold and unreachable. He prided himself with being closed off and not letting anyone know who he truly was or what he truly felt. He liked to keep his emotions hidden away and hated the feeling of vulnerability that came with showing anything he kept inside.

Pansy, however, prided herself with seeing past Draco’s façade and with knowing him better than anyone else ever could. 

They had been friends since they were little. So little that she couldn’t even remember when they had met or a time before him, she just remembered having him in her life. There was no one else she was this close to and she knew that there was no one else that knew Draco as well as she did. She could see past the cold exterior, the poker face and the unfeeling attitude he tried so hard to show everyone. 

It was only logical that she had seen through the whole ‘Potter thing’, as she had come to call it. She could see through the annoyance, through the insults and the so-called hate. Draco talked more about Harry Potter than about anything else. He complained about him, insulted him and whined about whatever stupid thing Potter had done that day every time he got the chance to do so. Potter got under Draco's skin in a way that no one else had ever been able to do.

But it was more than that.

Pansy saw the glances Draco kept throwing Potter’s way whenever no one was looking, whenever there was no danger of being discovered. Draco was careful about it, always being subtle and sneaky. But Pansy was used to Draco’s nature, to his way of acting and, after all the years, she could now see past it. She knew that what he felt for Harry Potter wasn’t hate. 

Draco had come to her at the end of fifth year, after his father had been sent to Azkaban and Draco had gotten the feeling that his life was going to take a turn. He had told her everything about how he had fallen for Harry Potter of all people. He had told her he hated those feelings more and more every day. He had told her that he hated Harry for being the way he was and making it inevitable for Draco to fall for him.

He told her that secret that he had kept to himself for so long and she had let him talk, open up and let it all out. The frustration and the fear of both the world they lived in and of getting a broken heart.

She was the only one who had ever heard him call Potter ‘Harry’. The only one he had ever trusted enough to confide in.

And now, two years later, she was the one looking at him as silent tears started appearing in his eyes at the Dark Lord's words. 

Harry Potter was dead, was what had been said.

And there was nothing Pansy could do but watch as her best friend, her ever strong and composed best friend, almost break down in front of light and dark side alike because the boy he had loved for so long, the boy who would never know Draco had loved him for so long, was dead. She could only watch as the floor opened beneath Draco's feet and he almost fell into the gaping hole of despair. 

She reached out a hand to grab Draco’s, trying to ground him enough not to let him fall completely and get lost in the sadness that was gripping at him and pulling him under. 

Not showing emotions was something she had learned to do throughout the years, but, at the face of the heartbreak written so clearly over Draco, she couldn't pretend like she didn't feel anything. She didn't want to pretend. 

Pansy squeezed his hand, ran her thumb in a caress over it and felt as it shook within her grip. She tightened her grasp.

There was a sharp intake of breath from behind her and Pansy turned her head to see none other than Hermione Granger, face covered in both soot and tears, hair a mess and clothes even worse, her eyes darting quickly between Draco’s miserable face and Potter’s body.

Then, her eyes met Pansy’s and she saw the realization in them. Granger opened her mouth presumably to say something about the situation in front of them, but no words came out and Pansy shook her head, turning back to stare at the middle of the battlefield.

***

In a strange twist of fate, one that Pansy was more glad to witness than she ever thought she would be, Potter made himself seen in the middle of the field once again. Very much alive.

Gasps filled the place, coming from both sides of the war, surprised expressions of anger on one side and relief on the other side. 

Harry Potter was alive. Apparently, the guy could defy death an unreasonable number of times and come glorious at the end. 

Pansy was happy that things were that way.

Not because she particularly liked Potter, but for Draco. Because the moment Potter had shown he was alive, Draco had trembled next to her, his eyes wide and still teary, his whole body shaking and his legs almost giving out.

She had steadied him before he could fall and had wrapped an arm around his torso, giving him as much support as she could, in any way he needed it. 

There was only a second of stillness and then all hell broke loose again. The silence went away and gave place to all the sounds that war brought together, curses were firing left and right and front and back. No one was safe.

In the midst of it all, Draco’s hand had slipped from hers, the chaos had engulfed them, separated them, and she had lost sight of him. 

She ran for cover behind a wall that had crumbled down after some kind of nasty blast and then she looked around and tried to find Draco in the midst of the battle.

There was a flash of white-blond, so fast she thought she had imagined it, running past the place she was hiding behind and towards the middle of the battle.

Pansy could only hope that Draco wouldn't turn his back on the self-preservation he had always lived by and get hurt… or worse.

***

The battle had ended. 

The Dark Lord had fallen and Harry Potter stood victorious looking at the place where he had vanquished his enemy. There was the sound of claps, the applause that everyone seemed to be participating in, but the boy who now lived twice didn’t seem to be hearing anything. 

He stood frozen, still staring at the lifeless body of the Dark Lord. 

Pansy looked around, eyes set on finally finding Draco, making sure he was alive and okay and wasn’t one of the many lifeless bodies that were littering the floor. 

She didn’t have to look much though. Draco stood, as frozen as Harry was, on the left side of the Great Hall, eyes on the boy he had been so worried about up until that moment. 

Pansy took one step forward, pushed a random Gryffindor out of her way and tried to push through the rest of the crowd to get to where Draco was.

However, when she got the front line, she stopped dead on her tracks and watched as everyone fell silent and eyed what was happening warily, some people even raising their wands and pointing them at the blond boy who had broken off from the crowd and had started walking towards their saviour.

The reaction of the crowd alerted Potter who moves for the first time to turn and look at where Draco is carefully walking, determined eyes set on him. And then their eyes met and before Pansy can even process it, Draco has broken into a run and has flung his arms around Potter in a hug that shocks everyone who is watching it all unfold. 

Some people go so far as stepping forward with their wands still trained on Draco and a few blurt out some threats. But it all stops when Potter wraps his arms around Draco as tightly as Draco's arms are around him.

“That’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever done, Potter,” Draco’s voice sounded loud in the otherwise dead silent Great Hall. “I should be around you more often to stop this stupidity from happening again.”

Pansy could tell by the tremble in Draco’s voice and by the way he was gripping Potter’s shirt so tightly in his fists that he had finally allowed himself to let the tears fall and to let the emotion that had been consuming him since the beginning of the battle, possibly even the emotion he had been keeping inside for months, out. 

“I think I’ll take you up on that offer.”

Potter’s voice was as shaky as Draco’s and his hand was running up and down Draco’s back in a comforting gesture that Draco wouldn’t accept from just about anyone. 

They parted slightly in order to look at each other’s face. Everyone else in the Great Hall was observing them, watching what was happening with interest and surprise and even fear, but the two boys seemed to have forgotten where they were and who they were with, simply lost in each other. 

“I thought you had died,” Draco sounded much smaller now, still audible but just barely, insecurity and fear pouring from his voice.

Potter shook his head, one hand going up to first touch Draco’s hair and then his face, eyes never straying from the other boy’s.

“I’m okay, we’re okay.”

Draco’s arms raised to wrap around Potter’s neck and, as if pulled by two magnets and to the collective surprise of everyone who was watching, they both leaned in and met in the middle in a kiss that was so intimate and vulnerable and fragile yet firm. 

Pansy had to look away, not wanting to intrude in a moment that was so clearly theirs. 

Her eyes landed on Granger again, Granger who turned her head at that moment and looked at Pansy too. There was still the same realization from earlier in her gaze from understanding Draco’s feelings, but there was more to it now. She nodded at Pansy before turning back to look at Weasley and Pansy couldn’t help but think that maybe Granger had been in the same situation as her regarding the two boys still embracing in the middle of what had been a battlefield moments before. 

Maybe Potter had been just like Draco, afraid and careful, hiding away and trusting only his closest friend. Maybe Granger had been Potter’s Pansy. 

From the way Potter was holding Draco against him, mumbling words no one else could hear in his ear and comforting him in any way he could, Pansy didn't doubt that Potter felt the same way as Draco. He looked just as relieved as Draco was to be alive and to be able to finally, finally experience this moment. 

Draco raised his head from Potter’s shoulder and his eyes found Pansy's in the crowd. There were tears still there and tear tracks on his face, but the smile on his face was one she hadn’t seen in years and she smiled back. 

She just hoped that the world and fate were saving the best of times for the two of them because, after everything they had been through, they deserved to live their best lives.

Together.


End file.
